Visual Studio Error: “Object reference not set to

Question

I have a weird behavior of Visual Studio 2013 (and 2010), that i cant seem to fix.

I know this is not directly related to programming (similar questions achieve the same error message via code, so i assume it is code within VisualStudio that has a problem).

My projects are C++.

Whenever i click on a project and open its properties, i get the following error box:

with the text:

Object reference not set to an instance of an object.

I can trigger that error message by selecting "Configuration Properties -> General". The view then does not show the information for "General".

My setting is the following: Windows 7 Enterprise SP1 64bit, Visual Studio 2010 (i need the compiler) and Visual Studio 2013 Professional (Update 4).

I have to work with these extensions:

• IBM Clearcase Integration
• IBM RTC VS Integration
• Visual Assist X
• Xoreax Incredibuild

What i did try without success:

• Remove all VS related files/folders in
  • %APPDATA%\..\Local\Microsoft
  • %APPDATA%\..\Roaming\Microsoft
  • %PROGRAMFILES%
  • %PROGRAMFILES(X86)%
  • %USERPROFILE%\Documents
• Repair/Reinstall VS2010 and VS2013 (i always installed VS2010 first)
• Reinstall .NET Framework 4.5.2
• Create a new project from within VS2013, i get the usual error plus:
• Use TotalUninstaller as described here to remove all extensions
• Hooking into the devenv process with WinDBG did not work (in non-invasive i couldnt get it to run)
• Start devenv.exe with safemode and log
• Uninstall NuGet as proposed here
• Create new solution and delete old .suo and .sdf files
• Look at output of ProcMon while triggering the error. I checked the registry for that key: nonexistent
• Look at logfile at %APPDATA%\..\Roaming\Microsoft\VisualStudio\12.0\ActivityLog.xml generated via /log: the keys are found within other keys of the value "(Default)". No clue on how to interpret that
• Reset all user settings via the (also secret) options named here
• Run .NET Fixing Tools and SFC
• Clean (remove from) registry
  • HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\
  • HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\

So my questions are

• How could i further debug the problem
• How can i really delete/reset all user settings and files and cleanup the registry
• Could this be related to solutions or projects
• Any third party components known to be problematic? .Net Frameworks?